Commata
There was once a man who spoke in inverted commas.
He couldn’t remember exactly how it had come about. They had infected his speech sometime near the end of the 20th century.
They began by infiltrating his use of the word hello. He found he could no longer say hello without encasing it in a touch of punctuation. “Hello”, he’d say, when he walked into a room. He found it easier than the naked alternative.
At first, the inverted commas were quite faint - just breathy little whispers, reminiscent of sighs.
Gradually, they started appearing round whole phrases: “how are you?” and “have a nice day” and “your life is safe with us” - for he was in insurance sales.
He rather liked them. He felt they implied a soupçon of je ne sais quoi, or certainly something French that made him sound more intellectual. They suggested, perhaps, that he knew more than he was letting on, and was cleverly hinting at layers of meaning beneath the surface banality of his speech.
Other people, anxious to appear in the know, never challenged him. They even became infected, and began speaking the same way.
“Pleased to meet you,” they’d say, and “you, too,” and “not today, Mr Josephine” - for that was his name.
For a while, he found it slightly disconcerting, but soon realised that with everyone being multi-layered and intellectual together, a touch of unease was only natural. He never realised that they only spoke that way around him.
The inverted commas gradually grew louder. Now, well into the 21st century, they’ve become so prominent that they threaten to drown out the words themselves.
For Mr Josephine, this has become a problem. Whenever he goes into the chemists to buy “aspirins”, he is sold condoms. When he goes to the doctor and complains of “bunions”, he is given a rectal examination.
He hasn’t sold a life insurance policy in months. “Your life is safe with us” now sounds like the kind of threat made by a staring madman in a scary movie. If he followed up with
bwa-haa-haa-haaaa-haaaaaaaaaaa
and lifted a kitchen knife, no one would be surprised in the slightest.
Poor Mr Josephine. He told his wife he loved her, and she shot him in the leg.
He couldn’t remember exactly how it had come about. They had infected his speech sometime near the end of the 20th century.
They began by infiltrating his use of the word hello. He found he could no longer say hello without encasing it in a touch of punctuation. “Hello”, he’d say, when he walked into a room. He found it easier than the naked alternative.
At first, the inverted commas were quite faint - just breathy little whispers, reminiscent of sighs.
Gradually, they started appearing round whole phrases: “how are you?” and “have a nice day” and “your life is safe with us” - for he was in insurance sales.
He rather liked them. He felt they implied a soupçon of je ne sais quoi, or certainly something French that made him sound more intellectual. They suggested, perhaps, that he knew more than he was letting on, and was cleverly hinting at layers of meaning beneath the surface banality of his speech.
Other people, anxious to appear in the know, never challenged him. They even became infected, and began speaking the same way.
“Pleased to meet you,” they’d say, and “you, too,” and “not today, Mr Josephine” - for that was his name.
For a while, he found it slightly disconcerting, but soon realised that with everyone being multi-layered and intellectual together, a touch of unease was only natural. He never realised that they only spoke that way around him.
The inverted commas gradually grew louder. Now, well into the 21st century, they’ve become so prominent that they threaten to drown out the words themselves.
For Mr Josephine, this has become a problem. Whenever he goes into the chemists to buy “aspirins”, he is sold condoms. When he goes to the doctor and complains of “bunions”, he is given a rectal examination.
He hasn’t sold a life insurance policy in months. “Your life is safe with us” now sounds like the kind of threat made by a staring madman in a scary movie. If he followed up with
bwa-haa-haa-haaaa-haaaaaaaaaaa
and lifted a kitchen knife, no one would be surprised in the slightest.
Poor Mr Josephine. He told his wife he loved her, and she shot him in the leg.
© 2004 & 2007 Jules Horne
1 Comments:
"I enjoyed this one, too"
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